Editorial: Suburban lawmakers must show independence on budget

Editor's Note: This editorial has been updated from its originally published version to correct the position of former state Sen. James "Pate" Philip in the 1990s to Senate president.

By now, no amount of scolding Illinois' political leadership can have much value. If the governor and every member of the General Assembly's two governing bodies don't at least feel a deep and personal sense of shame for having completed two full legislative sessions without reaching a budget, heaping on more vitriol at this point seems fruitless.

But we do have some words we hope can have some influence on matters, particularly for suburban Democrats. They start with the repeat of a refrain that we and others have raised literally for decades. It can be a mystery to no one that we are in the position we are in because of governing rules that give a single lawmaker, the speaker of the House of Representatives, almost insurmountable power and influence. Those rules must be changed, but that will not happen until rank-and-file legislators begin showing the courage and independence to put their constituents' interests ahead of their personal political interests.

That will require a willingness to support leadership challenges to the existing speaker and, in the course of everyday business, the political backbone to break with the speaker's orders when the interests of the state, the suburbs and individual citizens call for it.

Suburban residents, businesses and governments are crying out for relief and reform on a host of critical issues, including property taxes, workers' compensation, public employee pensions and school funding. They're getting no help from suburban Democrats marching in lockstep to the dictates of House leadership - a leadership that at one point in recent weeks vowed to block or ignore rank-and-file working groups on the budget and that all but boasted on Tuesday night, as the legislative session drew to a close, that budget talks "haven't even begun."

At least five suburban Democrats perhaps opened a path for others when they opposed Speaker Michael Madigan's $7 billion unbalanced budget proposal Tuesday. The action of Democratic Reps. Scott Drury of Highwood, Jack Franks of Marengo, Stephanie Kifowit of Oswego, Elaine Nekritz of Northbrook and Carol Sente of Vernon Hills were perhaps more symbolic than effective in an otherwise partisan vote that passed 60-53, but it was an important symbol.

House Republican Leader Jim Durkin of Western Springs couldn't have been more right when he described as "laughable" House Democrats' complaint Tuesday that they didn't have enough time to consider a late budget proposal put forth by Rauner. These, of course, are the same House Democrats who had no problem last week quickly passing a 500-page budget they'd been handed only an hour earlier.

Two years ago, then-Rep. Mike Bost, a Murphysboro Republican, angrily threw the pages of a pension-reform proposal into the air and decried circumstances that allow votes on complicated issues sometimes within minutes of their proposal. A video of his eminently appropriate tirade went viral on YouTube. People laughed. Nothing changed.

How can such circumstances qualify as acceptable, let alone good, government? How can a lawmaker in good conscience support a 500-page $7 billion unbalanced budget he or she has had less than an hour to review? Suburban lawmakers must rise up to condemn and change such practices.

That appeal applies to both parties. In some measure, today's Republicans are feeling the pain of similar practices sown by then-Senate president Republican James "Pate" Philip of Wood Dale in the 1990s. And just this week, Durkin acknowledged that two Republicans - David Harris of Arlington Heights and David McSweeney of Barrington - would not be disciplined for breaking GOP ranks on a bill involving the city of Chicago's pension debt. The merits of that bill are certainly open to debate and Durkin's response in this case is certainly the appropriate one, but the fact that state representatives have to weigh the potential for retribution from their leadership for voting their consciences suggests a serious flaw in our system.

In a press release Wednesday touting the Senate's approval of an education-only budget compromise, Sen. Dan Harmon of Oak Park expressed the hope that in the important days ahead "everyone involved in this process (will) be honest and forthright about their priorities and their intentions." We read that phrase to say it's time for everyone to stop playing games with the money of Illinois taxpayers, the educations of Illinois children and the lives of Illinois citizens in need. And the games will end only when rank-and-file lawmakers, who have been all too willing to let their leaders do the heavy lifting and then throw up their hands in mock impotence when the public complains, stand up and demand it.